I'd been diagnosed by my GP as cluster migraines and treated for the last 20 years as that, but your wife's experience and a quick skim of the first article is absolutely spot on for me, invariably over my left eye starting 4-5am and I can only describe it as feeling like having a railway spike driven into my head & through my eyeball, the pain is literally sickening. I can totally empathise with her banging her head and the eye socket thing, I bash the heels if my hands onto my head & press up on my sockets at the bridge of my nose as hard as possible, it often feels like there is an immense pressure building and building in there and you'll do anything to vent or try to shift it, logic goes straight out of the window. My wife has found me on several occasions curled up in the shower in the early hours whimpering like a dog with it as hot as I can bear it, pressed directly onto my head just trying to spread the pain about, to the point where I've scalded my scalp and forehead and just not noticed until the headache dies down.
It could explain why I get one or two in each spate that just overwhelm whatever medication I've been prescribed to routinely suppress or individually attack them.
Does she get low level regular headaches in the meantime between the cluster ones?
No, she does not get low level headaches at all.
You may need referring to a specialist - in our experience 3 GP's had no idea what my wife was going through.
Cluster headache suffers usually do a strange 'dance' when they are having an attack - pacing back and forth in a odd jittery fashion.
Some poor souls have these attacks every day of their lives - must be a nightmare.
Attacks are linked to the sufferers circadian rhythm - some people have them every day at the same time. Offer people have them every Spring, Autumn or both.
My wife has hers every 18 months for about 6 weeks at a time. Every attack starts at 1am on the button.
She uses Sumatriptan (which is also a Migraine treatment):
http://www.nhs.uk/Conditions/cluster-headaches/Pages/Treatment.aspx
Tablets are a waste of time. They take at least 40 minutes to work by which time she is at her wits end.
Inhalers work in about 15 minutes and injections take about 2 mins. She uses the injections a lot - it's a bit of a battle to get a good stock from the GP as they are expensive.
Once the drugs have 'hit' you would be hard pressed to know how much pain she was in aminute or two beforehand.
She takes anti-nausea drugs (which occasionally make her sick!) to counteract any side effects of the Sumatriptan - these drugs totally flatten her though.
I'd go and get a good diagnosis if I were you,
Further reading - this is a first class resource:
http://www.clusterheadaches.com/
Good luck with getting your problem sorted!
